[esperent]

> In many countries - you have to regularly deal with drivers going full tilt, on the wrong side of the road.

I don't agree with most of your comment but this point is worth examining. I think it's not an argument against self driving for a few reasons:

1. There's lots of places in the world where people driving on the wrong side of the road is uncommon. We can start with self driving there. You can apply this to many other situations as well - AI can't handle ice yet? Well, let's start with non-icy roads. Even when you apply all the stipulations like these that you need, you'll still be left with a large enough percentage of the world to make self driving useful. Especially since a lot of the places that are suitable will be rich cities in developed countries.

2. Driving habits change. Thailand is a good example of this, it's a country in transition from the "developing country driving style" to the "developed country driving style", for want of better terms. Driving there 15 years ago was an extremely different, far noiser, far more dangerous experience than driving there now. It's still got a long way to go, of course.

3. If self driving becomes the norm, well then, problem solved. We don't even have to get to FSD. Partial but always on assisted driving that nags you whenever you drive on the wrong side of the road or go over the speed limit would probably be enough to cause a shift if most people have it.

[intended]

Therein lies the rub

Movement, is animal like - perceiving self, environment and understanding movement through it. - Movement is universal. Its the application of physics.

Thats not driving.

Driving is a social construct. It is the application of physics while navigating a social world.

Driving is observing the law, observing social constructs (that differ regionally), adapting to new constructs based on location and environment.

Thats the blind spot for self driving proponents. They conflate the two things, but talk primarily about the first.

As a result, you will never get self driving - the assumptions are wrong.

Let me put it this way - you get self driving when a car decides its best course of action is to reverse in traffic, because it perceives a tsunami coming from ahead of it.

[esperent]

> Driving is a social construct. It is the application of physics while navigating a social world.

Interesting way of looking at it. In the countries where people tend to drive at high speed on the wrong side of the road, I'm inclined to agree with you.

In countries where people follow the rules of the road, I think it's the opposite. There, it's primates who evolved to follow and react to a complex social and physical environment being forced to follow a simple and rather tedious set of rules, which require constant vigilant attention. This is something we humans are not good at - we're designed for short bursts of attention in situations where rules need to be interpreted intuitively, not driving for three hours while strictly following the rules of the road.

> observing social constructs (that differ regionally)

Well, the social constructs around driving also different temporally and are changing all the time. Self driving, even partially implemented, is sure to have profound effects on these cultures all over the world.

>perceives a tsunami coming from ahead of it.

In extreme cases like tsunami, floods, or fires, there are solutions. In the short (and probably medium) term the cars will still have human controls, so the human can instantly take over. In the long term, well maybe there can be a "panic button" that allows a human to shout voice controls. Either way, it's just another solvable technical issue, and probably much easier than many other issues that need to be solved.

BTW it's not like researchers haven't considered to these things

https://www.thecarconnection.com/news/1122534_self-driving-c...